Romina discovered she was pregnant in 2021 at age 39 while homeless and without money. She initially pretended the pregnancy did not exist. She had been homeless for nearly seven years by the time bodily changes appeared. Prior to homelessness she lived in The Hague with a man who became controlling, restricting work and friendships, spying on and threatening her. She fled around Christmas 2014. Earlier traumas included her parents' divorce, years of sexual abuse by a stepfather, her mother's suicide in 2009, estrangement from half-siblings, and separation from her two sons. Early nights on the street were cold and traumatic, often spent walking, crying, or sleeping in a parking garage; she perceived shelters as risky and preferred outdoors except in winter.
When Romina discovered she was pregnant in 2021, she was 39 years old and homeless, without a euro to her name. She did what many a lonely and frightened woman has done throughout history, on learning that she was going to have a baby, and pretended she wasn't. 'If you don't think about it, it doesn't exist something like that,' she told me, more than three years on.
Her ex had political clout locally, so Romina felt that the only way to prevent him from tracking her down was to disappear into the city's shadow world. The first night on the streets was the worst, she said. It was raining and cold. She didn't have enough money for a hotel, and the little she had, she knew she had to keep for food, so she walked, and cried.
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